# Wind and solar curtailment by province (弃风弃光) — renewable utilization

The buildout's hardest math. Wind + solar are now **47%** of installed capacity (1,840 GW at end-2025, past
thermal for the first time; NEA grid-connection and operation release of 2026-02-12), yet the western basins
that host them can't always use what they make. National renewable utilization is **still falling**: in the first
half of 2026 it was 90.9% for wind and 91.4% for solar.

## First half of 2026: utilization fell again (curated · sourced)

| | H1 2026 | H1 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wind utilization | **90.9%** | 93.2% | −2.3 pp (our subtraction) |
| Solar utilization | **91.4%** | ≈94% | down from ≈94% (NEA rounded the H1 2025 solar rate to a whole number) |

- Share of output curtailed (100 minus utilization), H1 2026: wind 9.1%, solar 8.6%.
- Sources: NEA press conference transcript, 30 July 2026
  (https://www.nea.gov.cn/20260730/3ce671c387574eeeb120fc3825be0399/c.html), verified; NEA Q3 2025 press
  conference transcript, 31 July 2025 (https://www.nea.gov.cn/20250731/83ffa46373ec42dd99e0e3271028c151/c.html),
  verified. Same NEA release series.
- **No provincial breakdown for H1 2026.** NEA's half-year release gives national rates only, and we did not find
  H1 2026 provincial utilization rates published anywhere. The province table below remains the 2025 full-year
  view, the latest available.
- Half-year rates are not directly comparable with the full-year 2025 rates below (different period and a
  different release).

## 2025 full year: the national trend was already down

- **2025 wind utilization 94.3%** (solar 94.8%) — vs **96.3% / 97.0%** in 2024 (Jan–Nov, same basis): −2.0 pp
  for wind and −2.2 pp for solar.
  (National Renewable Energy Consumption Monitoring and Early Warning Center / Power Industry Planning Research
  and Monitoring Early Warning Center, 2026-02-06 annual + 2026-01-12 Jan–Nov)
- Wind+solar installed **1,840 GW / 47%** by end-2025; new renewable additions 452 GW (+21%).

## Four provinces above 10% solar curtailment (2025)

| Province | 2025 solar utilization | Full-year solar curtailment rate | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tibet | **65.8%** (Jan–Nov; 63.8% in November alone) | **35.1%** | National worst — solar runs ~2/3 capacity |
| Qinghai | <90% | **16.6%** | Basin saturation |
| Xinjiang | <90% | **13.7%** | Record additions vs export runway |
| Gansu | <90% | **10.4%** | The Gansu–Zhejiang UHV DC line is expected to lift Gansu's wind and solar utilization from about 85% to over 90% |

> Solar curtailment rate = 100% − solar utilization rate. Provincial figures per the NEA New Energy [2021]
> No. 25 disclosure rule. Source: National Renewable Energy Consumption Monitoring and Early Warning Center,
> 2025 provincial release (2026-02-06).

## The spectrum of utilization

- **At 100% (no curtailment, 2025):** Shanghai · Zhejiang · Fujian · Chongqing — east-coast load centers use every watt.
- **Under 95% (2025, solar):** Hebei · western Inner Mongolia · eastern Inner Mongolia · Shaanxi · Ningxia · Yunnan —
  the second tier, slipping not yet critical.
- **The western basin** (Tibet, Qinghai, Xinjiang, Gansu) is the entire problem: the places building the most
  renewables are the places least able to absorb them.

## What's driving it

- **The "turning point":** 2025-07-04 NEA / Science and Technology Daily headline — western green-power
  utilization reaches a turning point. Utilization in the resource-rich west fell through Jan–May 2025; solar
  was under 90% everywhere in the west except Ningxia.
- **Station-level reality:** Shenzhen Energy's Shule solar plant ran at only **67.61%** station utilization in
  Jan–Apr 2025; CGN New Energy's 2024 wind/solar utilization hours fell 3.1%/16.8%; Datang wind 2,127 h (−107),
  solar 1,211 h (−81).
- **Export is the lever, and it works:** the Hami–Chongqing UHV DC line (Hami → Chongqing, backed by 14.2 GW of
  dedicated generation, >70% of it wind and solar) will send 36 TWh a year to Chongqing once complete, >18 TWh of
  it from wind and solar; the Gansu–Zhejiang UHV DC line is expected to lift Gansu's utilization from 85% to 90%+.
- **Market-driven, not just physical:** the market-based on-grid pricing reform for wind and solar (2025-06-01)
  shifts the curtailment pressure from utilization rate onto price signals — the count of "used" energy matters
  less than what it clears at.

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*Provincial view as of 2026-02 (2025 full year); national half-year rates through 2026-06. Primary sources: NEA
press conferences of 2026-07-30 and 2025-07-31; National Renewable Energy Consumption Monitoring and Early Warning
Center annual and Jan–Nov releases; NEA / Science and Technology Daily turning-point analysis; NEA "2025 renewable
energy grid-connection and operation"; NRDC 2025 study on inter-regional power balancing. Utilization counts only
output curtailed for system reasons (NEA Electric Power [2024] No. 44 definition).*